"It was so overwhelming the whole day," said Shannon Purcifer, 16, of England. "I didn’t think that people could be that nice because of how horrible people had been."

Shannon told InsideEdition.com she suffers from bowel disease, ulcerative colitis and arthritis. As a result, she is often hospitalized, sometimes for weeks at a time.

Shannon said that her frequent absences and illness often led to torment at the hands of bullies.

"It was horrendous," her mom, Claire Carstens, told InsideEdition.com. "It’d been going on for such a long time. I tried so hard to put a stop to it but the school didn’t help us. I just felt lost really. There was nothing I could do but let her talk to me."

When prom night came along, Shannon went up to her mother sobbing, and told her she didn't want to go.

"I didn’t really want to feel uncomfortable for the whole night," Purcifer said. "I didn’t want to miss out on the few close friends I have [and] I wanted to really badly and [the bullying] got worse and worse."

She ended up staying home, and Carstens, heartbroken, put a picture on Facebook of her daughter wearing her unworn $600 prom dress.

"She should have gone to prom tonight and worn this beautiful dress but because of bullies she chose not to go," Carstens explained.

Eventually, the post picked up traction, and people from their community began putting together a makeup prom for Shannon.

Strangers came by their home to do her nails, hair and make-up, and by the time she was ready to head off to her party, a team of 120 bikers from the Gosport Scooter Club picked her up on the back of a three-wheeler bike.

"[The bikers] came into the street. Everyone was coming out of their houses watching, wondering what was going on," her mom said.